10/6/2025 Boilermaker Water Cooler Chat: Illini Illness
Rants, ravings, & somewhat sensical opinions following the wacky Universe of Boilermaker sports.
My heart is full, as just 48 hours ago, I brought our next generation Boilermaker offspring to visit sweltering campus, for a nooner against a tough Illini team. A few cocktails, a few trips to the concessions, & several hearts runneth over with love. Afternoons like this are something that I am grateful for. After the game, we went venturing across the river. A BPT sammy, & a couple of hugs later, everyone was back on their way. I miss many opportunities to be a fan, to be able to take my family to these things. I often forget how fun these games are when I am not being a somewhat coherent journalist.
I am grateful for nearly perfect afternoons such as this. Nearly perfect… because…
The Game:
#22 Fighting Illini 43, Boilermakers 27
I am currently fighting the rare October sunburn while getting over the autumn heat stress, as this game was a scorcher. While the game was fun, the Boilermakers were unable to take the heat. Boilers’ offense took care of business. Everything else… not so much.
Ryan Browne brought it, passing 30/50 for 302 & a score. He ran for 22 & a score as well. Harris, Mockobee both ran for a score as well, as the team went for over 150 on the rush.
The Illini were effectively unstoppable on offense. Altmyer threw for 390 & a score, with over a 100 on the rushing effort, with 3 more scores.
Purdue – Illinois Photo Gallery by Mark Elsner: https://iscpurdue.com/purdue-vs-illinois-10-4-25/
Wrap-Up:
This team shows fight, I will give them that. The Boilermakers were still in it until the final minutes. Yes, a miracle was possible late, but clearly it never came to fruition. They kept fighting, kept plugging away, & kept their helmets up.
This offense got 4 scores. If you cross the goal line 4 times in a game, statistically you are in position to win. That is unless the other two phases of football pull their weight. Not this game. Fumbles. Penalties. Butterfingers… all of these sent home a nearly full house, a team, & a coaching staff extremely pulling their hair out.
What Went Well:
- Ryan Browne: Is willing this team to win. He looks much sharper, no turnovers, as he threw all over the place.
- 3: Punts taken in by the Boilermakers this game. The Trojans & Irish together… 0 punts, so this was a welcome change.
- 14.5: Average tackles this game from the linebackers Correa & Powell. 15 & 14 respectively.
Opportunities for Improvement:
Now is time for an English lesson, you nerds. A pangram is a logical sentence which contains all of the letters of the alphabet. Just google “The quick brown fox” & you’ll see a little bit of fun trivia. Why am I bringing this up? You might have seen some strange phrasing in this article. You probably saw some grammatical imperfections, & some liberties taken with the English language. This is not my normal style. You see, I have yet to use a very common letter of the alphabet three quarters into this article.
That is the letter D. Go ahead, check my work. Reread a few hundred words and see if you can find it prior to this line. I will wait.
Why have I refused to use the letter D?
PUR_UE.
Currently there is no D in Purdue.
- Defense: Doesn’t live here. The secondary has been playing against some of the best offenses in the nation the last few weeks. Two weeks in a row garnering 0 punts, then give up 43 after a bye week. Yes, this team is still a mile better than what they were last year. They still have miles to go in order to be competitive against good B1G teams. Spurred in part by a mid-week Tony Grimes injury, the secondary had no communication, no cohesion, and no chance to stop Illinois in the long term. We are in the mid-season at this point. Frequent communication errors should not be happening at this point. WRs should not be running free when bracketed or having a safety over top.
- Dropsies: Oh wait, maybe we found some D here… Purdue’s WRs have been a strong point this year, with the exception of this weekend. Browne threw for 302 yards, but had the Boilermakers receivers not been handing out drops like Oprah Winfrey at her celebration shows, Boilers could’ve had 400 yards, and another score or two. Completely different game. You get a drop! AND YOU GET A DROP! [Illini crowd cheers fervently].
- Dumb Penalties: Yep, more D. Killing a defensive stop by hitting someone 35 yards away from the play and achieving a “blindside block” on the defense… not good. Being 3 yards in the backfield, pre-snap, on a blitz when it is 4th and 3… Come on… 8 penalties for 61 yards in a two score game.
- Dört: Is the number 4 in Turkish. Thats how many timeouts Illinois used in the 3rd quarter. Yeah, you read that correctly. Big Ten Officials had to correct the mistake that they got themselves into… great job.
- D’oh!: The sound that left my lips following a special teams turnover, sucking the air out of Ross Ade Stadium. (Lets be fair, I didn’t say d’oh!) EDITOR’S NOTE: I could hear what Ben Said from the press box. Wasn’t “d’oh!”: confirmed.
Big Man on Campus:
Due to popular demand, there will be no BMOC award given this week. Coffee is for closers.
Volleyball Killing It:
The Team, The Team, The Team! Coach Dave Shondell has the girls flying high after a pair of “sweeps” in the City of Angels. It all started late Thursday night with a reverse sweep against #24 UCLA. Coach Shondell called it a “signature win” for the program as the Boilermakers fought off 4 match points and Kenna Wollard became just the 4th player to record 33 kills in a match for Purdue. Take a look at the energy in the post below!
Then Saturday night the Boilermakers used the broom again as Purdue swept #17 USC – Quite a road trip for The Team!
A Look Ahead:
The Purdue Football Boilers are heading to equally struggling Minnesota for a night game, next week. While the Boilermakers will be more than likely an underdog this game, the eye test tells us that they should be able to hang. It will be nice to not be playing a ranked opponent, after 3 straight weeks of doing so. Hopefully the Boilermakers iron out their problems, and get back on the winning side of things in the month of October!
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